In Which
by Chokopoppo
Summary: A number of things happen, most of them within the confines of the wild west we know and love. Catch yourself up in broken romance, sharp shooting, and an excellent hat.
1. The Lawmaker and Lawbreaker Confer

Chapter 1:

In Which the Lawmaker and the Lawbreaker Agree

**A/N: Oh look, a western AU. I am basically fantastic and original in every way. I have been working on this goddamn thing for a stupidly long amount of time, you have no idea.**

**Anyway, here you go.**

~!~

"I'll ask you once more, sheriff." The sound of a cocking gun. "Give me the badge, and everyone can be happy. Eh?"

Silence for a moment. "And by 'everyone', I assume you mean yourself. What do you suppose this badge could do for you, may I inquire?"

"You can ask, but I ain't gonna answer. Now, give me the goddamned badge."

"No."

"Sheriff!" The gun was repositioned against the side of the sitting man's head. He made no move, no noise or fuss, just stared at his own steepled fingers.

"What is my name, sir?" Silence greeted the sheriff. "As I thought. You don't know. I'd bet anything you don't care, either." A pause. "No. I will not give up something like this to someone like you."

"Fine." A grin spread over the face of the gun-holder, as though he'd been looking for an excuse. "Then I'll pry it off of your cold, dead body."

And the room was filled with the bamboo crack of a gun.

~!~

It wasn't like Jimmy MEANT to do it.

OK, so that was a lie. It's hard to not mean to shoot someone in the head, especially if you're not meaning to have a gun, too. No, he sure as shit meant to do it.

He just didn't mean to get CAUGHT.

The whole thing had just gone too fast. One minute he was sitting in some saloon, playing poker and generally making money off of idiots, until some jackass had called him a cheater and a few other names he didn't care to repeat. He'd replied, but angered the entire table instead of belittling one man, and then he'd been running for his life, plowing through tables, jumping over the bar counter, and taking a backdoor to freedom while the entirety of the saloon occupants recognized him and realized that he owed them money or something of that ilk and joined together to tear him to shreds. And in the heat of the moment, he'd aimed randomly and fired. And someone ended up pretty dead. And he was in a shit load of trouble now, like woah.

If there was one thing Jimmy had learned in life, it was that mobs are generally made up of a bunch of totally reasonable people who, upon getting together and maybe getting some pitchforks or torches or rope or something, become complete dicks who won't stop until the object of their hatred is destroyed and strewn across the ground. And when you're said object of hatred, that pretty much equates to 'lynch the shit out of him'.

That was the problem with being hated on sight.

Jimmy, himself, had only been part of a mob once, when he was a kid, and that was only because his father had ordered him to stay home, and he'd fancied himself a rebel. His sister had obediently gone up to bed, but he'd taken the window route back down, much to the chiding and worries of the little irritant he called a sibling.

Idly, he wondered where she was now, then figured she was probably as dead as he was going to be. Girls were all bark and no bite, anyway.

The feeling of rope gnawing into the flesh of his wrists brought Jimmy back to the present, but not for long. A million thoughts, countless memories, clawing desperately for attention, pushing to the front of the line, suddenly made death seem…unimportant in comparison. He had shit to remember, and the sudden realization that he had a very short period of time in which to do so seemed to open the floodgates. The splintering rope on his wrists and neck, the violent shoves from his holders, the raging tide of animalistic fury the crowd emitted, all seemed like background music, like the piano player in the bar only minutes before. It had nothing to do with the cards in his hand, or, in this case, the memories dancing in his minds' eye.

Woah, did he really think all that? When did he turn into captain poetic pants? Someone had called him that, he remembered, when he was a kid. It was a girl, he was pretty sure, who went to the same schoolhouse. She was older than him, with dark hair and darker eyes. Prettier than most other girls he'd seen, and certainly prettier than his sister or mother. He'd remedied that by pulling her hair later, made up some rhyme. She'd yelled that when she was a teacher, she wouldn't let his kids in her school, no way, they'd be just as stupid as him, he was such a jerk.

If he ever met her again, he'd buy her a drink. But then, he didn't have kids, didn't need to pop in to some random schoolhouse and meet her by accident. Plus, he was going to die.

Wasn't he?

The sudden loss of breath and sudden panic that overtook him reassured Jimmy that yes, he was going to die. Shortly. With a black tongue.

Memories coming faster now, urgently, only a flash of one or the other at a time. A dog in a cage on the side of the road. Catching cicadas in the summer, chasing his sister with one to make her shriek. Seeing the face of the woman he'd lost his virginity with, and realizing she was barely as attractive as the dim lighting and alcohol had made her seem. A man holding his sister by the waist, being flooded with feelings of rage, instinctual protection. Helping a little girl off her knees. The glare of a man he'd never met, boring into his neck. The sting of a thrown rock. Stealing a horse. Kissing a man, with no inclination of stopping. The sound of a gun, firing into a man who barely deserved it. The thrill of theft, murder. Hearing a woman, undoubtedly a whore, screaming from the alleyway and hurrying away as fast as possible. Two black corpses, swinging in the faint summer breeze.

Pain. Amusement. Pleasure. Rage. Lust. Self-loathing. Lies.

And he couldn't breathe.

~!~

Miles away, in a far less dramatic scene, a woman nursed a glass of vodka at an isolated table in the corner of a tavern. She probably could have been beautiful, if only stress and worry and general frustration hadn't aged her to look thirty, when she was barely twenty-five. But she'd taken a certain job, and she had to accept that stress came with it. She wasn't sure where the other two came from, but she figured they flowered from the first reason or human stupidity.

Human stupidity that was, as of right now, being pushed towards her in the form of two giggling girls(maybe twenty-one or twenty-two), approaching her with obvious intent to mock. The woman glowered, then downed the rest of her drink and pushed the glass away.

One girl stood out, and it wasn't just because her dress was red, while that of her companion was the same beaten brown as the dusty atmosphere. It gave the nagging feeling she'd seen her somewhere before.

"So, my companion an' I were jes' wond'rin' if ya knew how ta smile, strangeh."

The woman raised an eyebrow at the girl in red, who seemed to be the alpha. Her accent seemed…forced. And she spoke too fast for your average southern drawl. Foreigner. That was hardly surprising. What interested her was the attempt at an accent, instead of leaving her voice as it was. There were enough families from the North (and other countries besides) that there was no real accent to cling to in the area. And the girl had a squint. If she had the money to buy a red dress (which looked rather new, so none of this 'belonged to my mother' jack), she should have the money to buy a pair of spectacles. If worst came to worst, she could at least sell the red dress and buy a less conspicuous brown one, and the difference in money would be enough.

"Strangeh? Cat got ye' tongue? Or are ye' jes' dumb?" The alpha smiled, and her beta giggled at the pun(which happened to double as an insult).

The woman made sure to pronounce every syllable with the crisp correctness of someone who is just seconds from punching your lights out. "I happen to be neither stupid, nor mute. Do you make a habit of approaching strangers? Now, if you and your friend would please hurry off…"

A cat's grin. "I guess you don', then. C'mon, then, le's leave th' grumpy ol' maid an' hava drink." The girl in red motioned to the girl in brown, and they turned to leave.

And in the woman's mind, something clicked.

"Hey, Anne."

The woman in red stopped and glanced back, confused.

"Where are your glasses?"

Anne barely had time to open her mouth in befuddlement before the glass (that used to contain our heroine's drink) made contact with her face, probably bruising a cheekbone and certainly breaking that once-attractive petite nose. She stumbled, tried to get her footing back, and probably would have succeeded had she not then received a heel to the gut.

In the time she had gained from throwing the glass, the older woman had gotten herself over the table (or around; no one was watching _her_ at that point) and delivered a kick. She would've punched, if it weren't for the fact that her right hand was going for her revolver, and the other had vaulted her over the table.

The gun was just for effect, of course. Anne was only wanted if she was alive. Her corpse wasn't worth anything to the authorities of the town. Something about hidden gold, whatever. The details made no goddamn difference.

Devi just did it for the check.

~!~

Edgar Vargas peeled groggy eyes open, stared up at the sky above him, and proceeded to let them fall shut again. The sun was shining obnoxiously bright somewhere overhead, and the general dinginess of his glasses could only stop so much light from filtering through.

He was lying by the side of a road he'd never seen before in his life, with not a soul to inquire about his current location. Every part of his body ached like it had been trampled under a stampede of anti-painkiller bulls, but the throbbing in his head took the cake. It was like someone was stabbing him repeatedly in the side of the head, or at least hitting him with some kind of, of, meat…mangler thing. What were those called, anyway? He could recall the woman next door using them, but they'd never talked much, and it wouldn't have come up, even if they had. Oh well. It didn't matter, he supposed.

There was no point in flipping his shit over his current position, either – worrying about being lost wouldn't get him less-lost, it would just get him worried and tense. It was important to come at this dilemma from a logical perspective. The sensible thing to do would be to stand up and assess his surroundings more thoroughly, find some kind of shade. The sun wasn't going down any time soon, so it would be best to get some cover. Trees or something, maybe a hospitable house in the distance…

Edgar pulled himself together and, with a bit of effort, got to his feet, swaying slightly as the blood drained from his head. But his overall pain quotient lowered, and he caught sight of his hat not three feet from where he'd been lying. Small mercies. He loved that hat.

After putting his hat firmly in it's place on his head, he scanned the landscape yet again. Dusty terrain, with scrubby bushes scattered here and there, but no houses and no trees, or even large boulders. Just a dirt road, cutting through the scenery and winding off over a hill and out of sight like an elusive snake.

Well. It was better than nothing, he supposed.

He adjusted his hat, stuck his hands in his pockets, and began walking down the road, whistling a tune slightly off-key as he went.

~!~

Imagine, if you will, the sound of a snapping rope.

There's the faintest of little _plinks_ as the first strings break away from each other. Then a ripping noise, as the majority follow suit. And then there's that _snap _of finality, as the final few cords tear in two.

In this particular case, you can follow that noise by the sound of a writhing body hitting the ground, catching itself on its knees for a second before slamming face first into the ground below. Jimmy was certain he'd broken his nose. Or his jaw. Or something.

Actually, he wasn't really concerned with that right at that moment. He was mostly concerned with taking huge, gulping breaths and forcing as much oxygen into and out of his lungs as fast as possible, coughs racking his body as his lungs rejected the dirt and dust in the air near the ground. He rolled onto his side, curling up into a fetal position to protect himself from any kicks that might be aimed at his prone body…but they didn't come. After a minute or two, he opened one eye and peered upwards, then pushed himself into a sitting position.

He was absolutely alone.

Well then.

Well then.

Well then.

He was about to think the words "Well then" yet again, but something cut his bemusement off. He definitely heard footsteps. Or pawsteps, as it were, considering it sounded very definitely like an animal. His head swiveled back and forth, trying to determine the source of the sound, and simultaneously noticed the rather unnerving fact that he couldn't hear any birds singing. Or the wind blowing. And that the forest in the distance was decidedly less distant than he remembered it. Plus, there was something buzzing in the air, a sort of wrongness that he could _feel_ as he breathed it.

OK. That was just fucked up.

Jimmy stumbled to his feet with some difficulty (the noose might've snapped, but the ropes binding his wrists hadn't) and tried to calm down as a very real fear spread like a cancer through his mind. He had no idea where he was, he was alone, and it was growing darker by the minute. He could hear the crack of a twig under something's foot, but found himself unable to determine the location. The blood pounding in his ears grew louder as he jerked his head around in every direction.

The growl of a feral animal is always unmistakable, though, and he whirled around in time to catch the eye of a very thin, mangy, and decidedly hungry-looking wolf.

Shit.

Jimmy didn't speak wolf. In fact, Jimmy didn't really talk to animals at all. He didn't even talk to other people that much. He didn't debate. In his opinion, when an argument wasn't going his way, the best solution was to shoot and leave.

But he couldn't get at his gun. First of all, his hands were tied behind his back, and second, someone in the crowd had made off with the damn thing, along with his shirt. So it was him against a pissed wolf, with nothing to defend himself with except his feet.

And on that note, he turned and ran.

~!~

There are a lot of things you could say about Tess Reed. They aren't all kind things, necessarily, but you take what you can get.

A lot of people would say that Tess was crazy. After the incident in the bar, no one blamed her. It was a lot to go through, watching your customers, coworkers, and boss turn into piles of bones and muscle, leaving only you (minus a finger). But because she never said much, it was impossible to track down the killer – she was the only one who could give a description, and her mouth was shut tight.

Regardless, Tess had been pitied by the owner of another saloon in the town over, and offered a job. Without a goodbye to her family or friends, she packed up her meager belongings, took the old horse that everyone said was only good for glue, and disappeared. No note, nothing.

Another thing you could say about Tess was that she didn't get attached to things. Not people, not places, not commodities. She could uproot herself from a town she'd lived in all her life and move to another one where she didn't know a single person, and it didn't make much of a difference to her.

She'd discovered that she didn't really need friends, anyway.

But Tess was smart, and everyone knew that. Even as a child, she was the first to call you out on a condescending or patronizing tone – and Tess held grudges. One of the most common theories on why she hadn't told the police anything about the killer was that she wanted to kill him herself, as the corpse of her current courter had been found among the rest of them. Others would argue that such a thing wouldn't make any sense – their relationship had been on the rocks for months, and he'd gone into the bar with the intention to break it off. He must've had time to say something nasty to her, at least, because whenever his name came up, she glared at the ground, then changed the subject.

She was crazy, detached, intelligent, and vengeful. Add those things up, and the first thing you get is "dangerous".

And she'd been eyeing a certain bounty hunter in her saloon.

~!~

Edgar couldn't say exactly how long he'd been walking. Long enough to be growing tired of walking, certainly, but he didn't have much of a choice. He'd considered sitting down on the side of the road for a breather, but decided against it. If he sat down now, who knew when he'd get back up again. So he continued on, hoping against hope for some sign that he wasn't going in circles, that the road wasn't some cunning trick in his mind to make him think he was going in the right direction.

Well. There was nothing wrong with a little paranoia now and again, was there?

In the distance, he caught sight of a cluster of trees. If only he'd come across that earlier, he'd have scurried to it immediately for some shade. But, from the looks of the setting sun, he wasn't going to need it. And after that long streak of unconsciousness in the afternoon, he wasn't tired, so finding somewhere to sleep wasn't too high on his list of priorities. Besides, wasn't sleeping in the woods more dangerous than sleeping on the side of the road? Not that they really counted as 'the woods', to be fair. It was a little…small. Very small, honestly, but Edgar tried not to judge.

Still, there was something compelling about it. Not necessarily in the 'I want to go take a look' kind of way, but Edgar had a very strong feeling that the trees were…important somehow. He stopped walking altogether and stared up at the shadow of the woods against the dying sun.

And nearly jumped out of his skin as a young man burst out of them.

Well, he couldn't say it was a young man for sure – it wasn't like Edgar had night vision or whatever. But the chest looked flat enough, and the silhouette was lithe enough to determine youth. But whoever it was didn't captivate his attention for long – that was the job of the largest wolf Edgar had ever seen, which was in hot pursuit of the other.

But that was no reason to panic and make a rash decision. It was always best to stay calm and be as logical about things as possible. That had gotten Edgar through life until now, and it wasn't going to change just because there was a giant, wild animal chasing a stranger in his general direction. He considered the problem. The wolf seemed like a threat. Then again, it might be domesticated, for all he knew. Obviously, he couldn't just kill it; and anyway, killing was just…wrong. He'd been forced into putting a mad dog or two down before, and it made him feel sick every time, even if the animal had to die for the safety of the people in his town.

So he wasn't going to kill this wolf, that insofar had done nothing but chase someone around. That left only the option of scaring it off, something Edgar would do gladly. He reached for his gun, feeling slightly more relaxed as he took it by the handle (he really ought to look into that), and aimed a shot between the wolf and the man.

The wolf made a high-pitched yip, turned on it's heel (or the closest it had to a heel) and shot back up the hill and into the trees. The young man took that time to turn around, notice it was running away, attempt to shout something witty at it as it went, and slam head-on into Edgar, knocking them both to the ground.

Edgar sighed. He really should've seen this coming. He always attracted weirdos like a magnet, even back when he was a…a…

His brow furrowed as the other man rolled off of him and stumbled to his feet, muttering curses. He'd been a…a sheriff. That was right. He'd had short-term memory loss or something. How else had he forgotten his profession? None of this 'been', either. He _was_ a sheriff. All this wandering around, it'd emptied his head of thoughts.

"Hey. _Hey_." The rather irritated voice broke his concentration, and he looked up to make eye contact with the stranger. He'd been right; it was a young man, shirtless and badly sunburned along the shoulders. "Would you just get up? It's not like I hit you that hard, even."

"Really." Something about the young man made Edgar want to stay on the ground, just to spite him. Weird. He'd never wanted to rile someone up pointlessly before. New sensation. "Only hard enough to knock me over, despite the fact that I was rather firmly grounded before you came charging out of nowhere? Surely, not hard at all." He sighed, then got to his feet and took a better look at the man. Not even twenty, from the span of his shoulders – but his face certainly showed its share of wear. Black eye. Split lip. "Regardless, I wouldn't suggest heading back that way, even if there wasn't a wrathful she-wolf waiting there to eat you. The…woods are no place for a growing boy. Certainly not in the evening. But you knew that, of course. Where the hell is my hat."

Jimmy didn't take lightly to being insulted, but before he could respond, his current companion simply continued speaking in a firm, implacable tone, and whatever response he may have made dried up on his tongue. "I…You…I didn'…wasn'…'s over there." He gave up on witty comments and just nodded towards the hat that lay on the ground.

"Thank you." Easy enough.

"So. Uh." Jimmy fumbled around for his once-excellent collection of punchy opening liners and came up short. "Your name. I want it. Give it to me."

"That was…possibly the most awkward wording of that question that I have ever heard," _And some people get _jittery_ when they ask the sheriff for his name,_ Edgar's mind added silently, like a stealthy, truthful arrow. "But at least you asked. Most people don't, I find." He held out a hand to shake, forgetting, for a moment, his companion's incapacity. "Vargas. Edgar Vargas."

"James. Uh, you wouldn't happen to have a knife on you or somethin', would you?"

"Afraid not." A sort of awkward silence settled between them. "So…where are you headed?"

"Nowhere special. Just not back to Warren," Jimmy jerked his head towards the hill he'd come from, "filled with a buncha insane motherfuckers an' a lotta rope. You?"

"Nowhere special, myself. Honestly, I'm just trying to find any town, so I can figure out where I am." Edgar shrugged. "Other than nowhere land."

"Where's the road lead?"

"Couldn't say."

"So it's an adventure, then."

"I guess you could say that."

"Think someone down the road'll have a knife?"

"I have no doubt."

"Then I'm comin' with."

Edgar raised an eyebrow at his companion. "Really."

Jimmy smirked. "Try and stop me."

"I wouldn't dream of it."

And with that, Edgar turned back down the road, and Jimmy fell in stride along side him.

~!~


	2. A Job Offer is Made

Chapter 2

A Job Offer is Made

**A/N: This chapter brought to you by Silverado and the soundtrack to Godspell.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own JtHM, nor do I lay claim to the scary monkeys involved in its production. The monkeys are very scary.**

~!~

"Reed, you've been washing that plate for the past two minutes."

Tess flinched at the sound of her boss's obtrusive voice. "Sorry, sir."

As the man bumbled off to bother someone else about keeping things tidy, Tess did her best to finish the dishes without getting quite so lost in thought again. Unfortunately, with no one to talk to and a vivid imagination, keeping her mind on the job was far easier said than done. Unpleasant memories had a knack for resurfacing at the most inopportune times, and they were swimming around the inside of her skull with wild abandon.

She remembered feeling a giddy surge of excitement in her stomach at the sight of her disemboweled 'lover', giggling to herself as the shock wore away. There was a memory, somewhere, of her boss slapping her for dropping a glass, and telling a customer that someone had pissed in her mother. But mostly, she remembered swallowing rage at anything any of her boyfriends had done, and the way she'd laugh at jokes made at her expense in an attempt to be liked.

She glared at the stains on the frying pan in her hand and scrubbed harder.

She could block it out. She used to be able to block it out. But now it was like the floodgates were always open, and no matter what she did, she couldn't stop the constant influx of thoughts and memories and emotions. And it was all _his_ fault.

He'd told her that remembering things took place above all else. That it was important to remember everything, even painful things, to record it all carefully and keep what was real and what wasn't separate. He'd convinced her to keep a journal, a journal she still had and wrote in every night on habit.

She'd be the death of him, he always said. And he was right. Tess _would_ be the death of him, she'd see to that.

And the woman in the overcoat would be the final confirmation.

~!~

Worn hands carefully organized coins in stacks of ten. Upon more careful inspection, one would realize that they matched no currency in any country – despite all being about the size of an American quarter, each was imprinted with a different face and tail. The woman stacking them muttered numbers under her breath like some kind of hoarding dragon, and flicked beads across an abacus.

"…I was supposed to get two more today." A sigh of exasperation. "What's taking them so long, anyway?"

A loud crash resounded through the small shack of a house, shaking the whole building and sending the laboriously stacked coins bouncing across the table and along the floor, and shaking the abacus beads out of their carefully organized rows.

She didn't really mind. She had as long as she wanted. But there was nothing wrong with enjoying the opportunity to scold.

"Tooodd!"

"Sorry, miss!"

~!~

As soon as her work hours ended for the night, Tess had her coat on and was out the door, a million things on her mind. Three things, however, pushed themselves to the front.

First, him. Enough said.

Second, the woman in the overcoat. Everyone had said that Anne Gwish, the thief with a bounty of five thousand dollars on her head, was massively dangerous, and impossible to spot besides – she was a master of disguise, the stories went. And yet, she'd been taken down in a minute. Less. Clearly, this bounty hunter was a skilled one, even if Gwish hadn't been as 'dangerous' as everyone said. Tess was going to have to do research, find out what her name was, who she was, if she was explicitly a bounty hunter or just did it on the side of another job. She couldn't have been married, Tess decided. It was just impossible, no matter how old she was. Not that Tess knew how old she was, she hadn't got a glimpse of the woman's face – but it didn't matter. A woman like that didn't get married.

Thirdly, her own finances. Tess had been saving for quite some time, but after the cost of her room and board, she hadn't been able to make all that much. It would've been wise to just stay with her parents and let them pay for her. Sure, it was a bit cruel, but really. They'd expected her to be married at age sixteen, and she was sorry, that wasn't going to happen, no matter how many relationships they tried to push her into.

Regardless, she wasn't sure exactly how much she had saved up in the past year or so, and she really wasn't sure how much it cost to order a hit on someone. She could only assume the two values didn't match up, because honestly, the probability of that was about…a million to one. No, a billion to one. Not her kind of odds. She was not a gambling woman.

But through the mental noise of all of her ponderings and fixations, she could feel that constant ache in her left ring finger growing stronger.

It was going to drive her well and truly off the edge one of these days, she just knew it.

~!~

Devi loved that feeling you got when you saw a dangerous criminal apprehended. Not because she really cared about locking Gwish up – though it was nice to see the obnoxious woman rotting in a cell, even if she was probably going to seduce her way out of it in a matter of time – but because that was when you got your money. It was massively satisfying to have dollars in your hand after watching the local sheriff count out the bills personally. In fact, if Devi had any friends, she might even set up a con that involved arresting one criminal over and over. She'd arrested a few criminals more than once, and no one really noticed.

It was amazing what you could get away with, if no one noticed.

Regardless, with bills tucked into her leather gloves (She didn't trust pockets with that much money – all the reward cash went into her gloves for safekeeping) and a pack of cigarettes tapping one out for the evening, she was all ready to enjoy a bottle of brandy and a real bed (and maybe a companion there, too). She couldn't spend too lavishly, she knew – but really, what's the first night with that extra five thousand dollars for?

Of course, the following morning would have to include scouting out a few more criminals; you didn't get by on just wanted posters, those were only the biggest outlaws who had committed murder or serious theft. But you could usually garner up some requests or cotton on to gossip. Family grudges, that sort of thing. Stolen heirlooms. The best thing to do was to strike up a conversation with a rich man and find out what he wanted. That usually supplied better pay for less work than going and finding a big bounty that countless other hunters would be going after anyway. But rich men rarely displayed their wealth on the table unless they were city slickers, and they rarely trusted people who grew up in the west.

But fuck the job for a while. That was what the first night back from one was for. Devi planned to spend it chugging a bottle of Unspecified Alcoholic Beverage and passing out in a dirty, tick-infested bed.

God she lived the life.

~!~

"Vargas! Hey, Vargas."

"Hm?"

"Are you, yanno…" Jimmy stared pointedly at the man walking next to him. "I mean…are you…I mean…you know?"

"No, James. I don't."

"I mean, y'know…y'know…" He floundered like a fish out of water for the words he was looking for. "I mean…what I MEAN to say is…" Another stare at Edgar, this one more of a sparkling, bright-eyed, child-like idealism than vague mistrust and suspicion. "Are you an Indian?"

Edgar was a man of cool disposition and rational mind. He didn't even fumble. "First of all, that was a massively politically incorrect way to word the question. It was offensive," he added, noting the blank stare of someone who probably knows what you're talking about, but don't want there to be a pop quiz, in case they're wrong. "And secondly, no. No, I'm not."

"Well…well that's just silly, Vargas. Ha. Silly. Oh!" The child-like idealism was back. "What's your _secret Indian name_?"

"I hate you."

~!~

Tess only had seventy dollars saved up in her little jar (labeled _Disposable Income_ in green ink). The number didn't change, no matter how many times she counted everything out, lying wrinkled bills out onto the table.

Tess didn't talk much, but she did listen. And she'd figured out that it usually cost five hundred dollars or more to order a hit. A life was worth about five hundred dollars, out here. Anne's bounty had been…what, two thousand fifty? No, it had been upped to five thousand after they'd found those two dead prostitutes behind the saloon she'd been staying at. She'd killed three…five people and stolen a little over six hundred in cash, buried it somewhere, and was probably being interrogated right now as to its location. And then there was Krik Marsher, with a bounty of two thousand (it was especially high for two kills, since they'd both been married women), and that 'black widow' Cleopatra, who's bounty seemed to rise every time Tess saw a new wanted poster for her.

Honestly. You'd think men would get the idea after a while.

Still, a hit was five hundred dollars, and that was four hundred and thirty dollars she didn't have.

But she knew someone that did.

~!~

The prison cell was an atrocity of a living space. Anne grimaced as she surveyed it yet again from the center of the room (where she wouldn't have to touch anything). The bed was rock hard and _dusty_, and she could just tell there were insects running rampant through it. The walls were sort of damp, in a clammy, slick sort of way, and the moonlight from the tiny barred window made some of the spots gleam like sweat. The cage of a door was rusty, and vaguely sticky to the touch in a way she wasn't comfortable with, and in the corners of the room, she was pretty sure she could see something growing.

God. Of course _she _got stuck here. Of all people, why her? She hadn't done anything wrong (well, not _really _wrong) to deserve it. Her pain was unbearable. She hadn't had a cigarette in hours, and she was stuck in the dress of a harlot she'd murdered (She was pretty sure no one knew about that yet). And she couldn't see jack shit. Unending misery was all this dreary little cell had to offer, and Anne was one to turn up her rather long broken attractive and sharp nose at such a thing.

Ugh.

It just wasn't fair. Sure, she hadn't technically been allowed to have all that money, but her rich lover had been in denial of his own oncoming death for a while and had never written a will. And those kills were all _totally_ justified. Like, back to that lover of hers – he was sick. In so much agony. Just because he wouldn't admit it didn't mean he didn't need a bullet in the head to put him out of his misery. And then, that guard – he wouldn't accept that she was just better than him. And Anne knew all about accepting her superiority. And that guy in the streets – hell-o! Did anyone else _see_ what he was wearing? Those clothes were absolutely weapons on her sensibilities, and he drew first. And then the whores…OK, that may have been unjustified. But they were already fighting, she just got in the way. Besides, she needed to ditch her glasses and get a dress, and both solutions could be found by their death.

And then when that uncouth _animal_ of a bounty hunter leapt on her, Cleo had run like the wind. Abandoning bitch. Could've at least busted her best friend out of jail before she…

Tapping on the window.

Anne spun around to face it, squinting against the unnaturally bright moonlight. The outline of a short-haired woman stood there, and Anne relaxed a bit. Of course Cleo wouldn't just run. She'd best be ready for a much-deserved tongue lashing, though.

"Cleo! What the _fuck_ was that all about, running off and leaving me in the lurch? I mean," She rolled her eyes, "I _know _being around the plebeians bothers you as much as me, but I got stuck with them! You could've at least _warned_ me." She took a step forward, lowering her voice. "Where'd you go, anyway? Head back to Layro to make sure it was all still there or something? Trust me, _no one _knows it's there but us. Carter has it under…control…"

She stopped.

The woman who was not Cleo smiled.

"Layro, huh?" Light glinted off of her spectacles. "Thanks for the help, Anne. I never would've guessed by myself."

~!~

"OK, how 'bout Soaring Eagle Hawk? Or like, the Indian equivalent of that?"

"James. For the _last time._ I do _not _have a 'secret Indian name'. And besides that, eagles and hawks are two completely different birds. Well, not completely," Edgar amended, the scholar in him forcing the truth out like a child holding their breath until they got candy, "they're both birds of prey, with similar diets and hunting styles. But they're still two different species, with multiple subspecies besides. The point is, no one bird can be both an eagle and a hawk."

Jimmy seemed to contemplate this. "But…_you're_ not a bird."

Edgar's palm really, really wanted to hug his face. So he indulged it. "No, James. I'm not a bird. Why would I be called one."

"I dunno. You Indians are just weird."

Edgar was about to retort with a 'I'm not an Indian' or a 'do you know how incredibly racist that statement is', or even a 'you know, Indian isn't the word you're looking for', when his eye caught on bright lights in the distance, far yellower than the stars above them. Candlelight. Lamps. Yellow lights meant a town, and a town meant people to get directions from and a bed to sleep in for the night. And probably horses to buy for riding purposes, to make the journey back much shorter.

"Vargas. _Vargas_. What about Howling Red Wolf?"

~!~

Layro was a small trading post of a town, about a half hour away if you were on a horse. It had a small restaurant, but no saloon or hotel – you brought your goods, sold them to the steady stream of customers and city slickers who hadn't realized they'd needed X to live out here, and at the end of the day, you packed up and begged, borrowed, or stole a ride to one of the neighboring towns for a place to sleep. Rarely did merchants work there for more than a few days at most, considering that _someone _was going to come back and complain if you stuck around too long. It also had the county graveyard. It made sense – you send your child there to get supplies, and one day your child brings you to be buried. It didn't cost much to have someone buried there, maybe five or six dollars – as opposed to the twenty or thirty it cost to bury someone in a specific town's graveyard.

Carter. Anne had said that someone named Carter had everything under control, so obviously, it was essential to find said person and get answers from him.

Tess knew she should've waited until the next morning – more than likely, Carter had already left town, unless he was one of about twenty permanent residents (unlikely) – but she didn't know how many days the woman in the overcoat would stay, and if she were to leave tomorrow, Tess would lose the only chance she was going to get. Bounty hunters weren't common in these parts, since the county was mostly unknown, and you certainly never got skilled ones. The woman in the overcoat was the only one she'd ever seen, rather than heard about; and Tess couldn't spend money or time moving to a new town, it cost more than she had.

So at forty-three minutes after midnight, Tess rode into Layro on her horse Boxer, shivering madly into her coat. She hated being out at night, it was cold as Hell itself. The stars were beautiful on the ride there, at least. He'd loved the stars.

Goddamnit.

Don't think about it, she told herself. Just keep your mind on task. Only on task.

It occurred to Tess that "Carter" may very well be a code word. Or maybe it was just a name. Either way, it was clearly something worth putting thought into. She steered Boxer towards what seemed like a good resting place and dismounted, looping his reigns around a nearby wooden pole and patting his neck endearingly before tugging her coat around her more tightly and striding away. He was a good horse.

The graveyard seemed a good place to start. Tess had a logical reason to check there first – it was a permanent fixture in Layro, unlike nearly everything else, and she'd spoken with Anne before. If her friend Cleo was anything like her, they'd have hidden stolen money somewhere dreadfully morbid. A graveyard would strike their fancy like a man slapping his wife.

Also, Tess had always wanted to be in a graveyard at night.

~!~

_Pastoral scene of the gallant South_

She remembered scars, and the sounds of guns. The scent of rotting flesh, blowing in from the South. Jaunty tunes on the wireless that her father had tried to smash once. Scuffles between dogs, and wind tearing at her skirt, and her father hitting her mother again and again, and crying about something she didn't understand, and turning up the music.

_The bulging eyes, and the twisted mouth_

Never crying when her father was angry. That was taboo. He wasn't angry often, anyway. Only sometimes, when pay was bad or he lost another job and he came home and drank himself into oblivion and hit things. The lamp. Her mom. Same thing, he probably thought.

_Smell of magnolias, sweet and fresh_

He taught her how to shoot a gun. How to aim, and when to use it, and why you used it to protect people, not hurt them. He would ruffle her hair – hair that wasn't the color of his or her mothers, but she never thought about that as a child – and call her his 'little prize', and they would go in and eat dinner. Like a family that worked.

_Then the sudden smell of burnin' flesh_

Devi woke up, shaking. She'd bitten her lip so hard in her sleep it was bleeding. She muttered the word 'fuck', because that was the only good response, and rolled over, trying to go back to sleep.

Somewhere, someone's radio was playing.

_This is the fruit for the crows to pluck_

_For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck_

_For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop_

_Here is a strange and bitter crop_

~!~

When Tess asked the gravekeeper about 'Carter', she was hoping for an answer. She was not expecting "Yeah, Fredrick Carter, died two months ago."

"Are you _absolutely sure_?" Tess couldn't help pressing. The man rolled his eyes.

"Look, lady. He's under six goddamn feet of dirt in my fuckin' graveyard. He has been for at least eight weeks. Even if he wasn't dead when he went down, he's dead as a fuckin' doornail now."

Tess rubbed the back of her neck nervously and glanced to her left. "Well…could you maybe…take me to the grave? His grave?"

The man swore a few times under his breath, unhooked a lantern from the side of his door and, sighing, pushed his way past her. Tess hurried after him (for being about a foot shorter than her, he sure was fast). He pointed at what appeared to be a cheap grave marker, with a shovel, a hammer, and a pile of dirt right up next to it. "Tha'ss the one," he yawned, then continued to scowl at her. "Say yer prayers or whatever, I'm going back to bed." And with that, the short man and the comforting glow of his lantern wandered off, light bobbing the whole way.

Tess was left in the dark. There was a grave before her, and a horse behind her, and a bounty hunter she needed but couldn't afford miles away. She stared pointedly at the marker. "So?" She asked the surrounding darkness. "What am I supposed to do now?"

And then a little voice in her head that didn't belong to her replied, _dig_.

~!~

The sun was just starting to vomit up light when her shovel hit wood. And it was about fucking time.

Tess grimaced and wiped at the sweat on her brow, only succeeding at smearing more crap onto her face. She probably looked like a miner, if you exchanged black coal smudges for brown grave dirt. This had to be the most immoral thing she had ever done, no questions asked. And it was so, SO illegal. It was nerve-wracking and her gut was twisting and oh God, why had she decided to do this? She was never doing anything like this ever again.

She did feel a slight jump of triumph as she finished scraping the dirt off the lid of the coffin, though. She wasn't going to back out now. She pried the nails out, all her effort on not thinking about what happened after this. This wasn't going to work, was it, she'd made some mistake, and she was going to be arrested probably for the rest of her life, she would have no money, he'd get away with _everything_, and it was all her fault for not thinking about this until too late –

The first thing that hit her when the lid came off was the _stench_. Rotting flesh and mold and decay. The sight of the cadaver didn't help either – something that used to be human, probably used to be handsome, sans eyes, sans lips, sans skin, but hardly lacking in the bones and rotting muscles and tendons. The raggedy clothing didn't hide the infestations of maggots in his chest, forearms, calves…

There was a box in his hands, but Tess was too preoccupied with clutching her mouth and trying to not scream or vomit (or both, simultaneously) to grab it, and every instinct was telling her to get the fuck out before whatever took him out went for her too, and the little rational part of her brain was telling her to grab the chest in his hands but it was covered in maggots too, and there were walls six feet high of wet dirt choking the air and strangling her and oh god get out get out get _out_

And she was burying her face in Boxer's neck, one hand clutching at his mane and the other on the handle to the chest, and she was hyperventilating and whimpering, tears melting at the dirt on her face, a puddle of vomit on the ground not seven feet away.

Oh no, she was _never _doing that again.

~!~

Todd wasn't what you might call fond of his position. He worked with a crazy lady (who insisted, for whatever reason, on being called 'sir') who was always meticulously doing something delicate, and whenever he dropped something or bumped into a wall, whatever she was doing would break or fall or scatter, and she would jump on him like a scorpion on…whatever scorpions jumped on. Scorpions were scary.

(Actually, when you got right down to it, everything was scary. But then, that was Todd for you.)

She seemed to take some sort of sadistic glee from tormenting him. He didn't pretend he understood. He just kept his head down and stumbled around with whatever she told him to carry, and acted like he knew what he was doing when he didn't. It was the only way to survive in this place.

Actually, maybe survive wasn't the right word. More like…hm. He didn't really have a word for it. Maybe 'continue existing', but that's really a phrase. Oh well.

Still, it wasn't a terrible place to be. Sure, some of the stuff she made him carry was REALLY HEAVY or sharp or white-hot, but after he dropped it and she scolded and he apologized, she didn't make him pick it up again. And besides, it was better than where he HAD been, not too long ago. At least the crazy lady didn't try to do experiments on him, or give him diseases on purpose, or live in a house that smelled like burning things. In comparison, it was pretty great.

He just really, _really_ wished she would understand that he couldn't really speak English.

~!~

Devi was back in the saloon. The same goddamn saloon. God_damm_it.

Her propensity towards the word 'goddamn' was the result of irritation towards the number of people who had been there yesterday, and had come up and tried to start a conversation, like she was Jesus fuckin' Christ or something. She was looking for jobs, and all she got was a myriad of praise and _you done good by us_ and _takin' out that criminal all by your lonesome, you tough girl_ and anything in between. This was the biggest pain in the ass since God invented hemorrhoids.

She sighed, blowing a stream of smoke through the cigarette she'd lit up not two minutes ago. It almost wasn't worth it, coming all the way out here; Gwish wasn't worth _that _much, and it was almost a two-day journey on foot. They didn't have any horses to buy around here, either – if there was a horse, it belonged to someone who had inherited it from their father or whatever, and it wasn't for sale. And no one seemed to have ever been out of their little dead-end town. They talked about anyone who had been (which seemed to consist of about three people) like you talked about siblings who got engaged – they all barely veiled their disgust, and leaned over tables, gossiping in stage whispers, as though they only wanted to give the pretense that they were keeping secrets.

It was kind of repulsive, actually. What was up with these people? You didn't get a _whole town_ of inbred hicks, did you? There had to be _someone _with half a brain. Maybe one of their 'foreigners'. Or. Whatever they were. Devi didn't know how to classify them, actually.

The next time a waitress came by, asking if she'd like another drink (seriously. These people acted like she was some goddamn _messiah_), she motioned for her to take a seat and proceeded to grill her for answers.

"So. Who is there 'round these parts who ain't from this town, kid?"

The woman seemed a bit befuddled, but was pretty willing to jump on the chance to gossip. "Well…thar was Anne thar, but ye' done gone an' take her off ter jail, so tha's no warry. Eh…oh! An' thar's Reed, an' Alexandar, an'…" She put a tanned hand to her chin, pondering. "…An' tha's it, I thank."

Devi nodded in faked interest. "Alright. So. Reed is…?"

The waitress took a breath and adopted a somewhat frightened face, pulling away from the table. "Oh, no, missus, ye' don' wanna git all wrapped upin' tha'. She's _crazy_," the woman dropped to the stage whisper everyone seemed to get off on, leaning forward across the table. Devi, in an almost-good mood, humored her, leaning forward herself. "She were thar down in Kintal when tha' whole thing happen'd. I mean…she were _thar _thar." The woman nodded solemnly. "In that thar roum. She…she…" she looked up, as though trying to remember the way something had been phrased by someone else. "…She done 'bared witness ta the crime'. Seen it with her own two eyes, she did. Made 'er crazy, et did." The waitress leaned back, as if remembering herself at last. "Rahl dangeras, tha' one. Dant ye' go lookin' fer her, she'za raiht one, yeh."

Devi leaned back too, taking a deep breath of her cigarette. "I'm looking for crazy," She started. "Where can I find her?"

No story is a real story without a contrived convenience. And that coincidence came with the sound of the swinging doors being pushed open, and a beaten-down figure making its way through.

One shoulder hanging lower than the other, a gait that lacked rhythm, and hair a mess, Tess Reeds had returned victorious. Under one arm, she held the box, and stared around the room.

Devi figured, from the way the woman she'd been speaking to jumped up and stumbled away in a hurry, that she was staring at Reed. Hardly made the girl more impressive; the eccentric were always seen as dangerous in small towns.

What did make her more impressive was the smell of rot pouring off her, which made itself more obvious as the girl made her way closer and sat down across the table. Reeds sat definitively, and slammed the box from under her arm onto the table, glaring over it at Devi. Devi looked at the box, then up at Reed, a severely unimpressed look on her face.

"You reek."

Reed scowled as her shoulders loosened. "I had no idea."

"So? Whaddaya want? I'm not buying you a drink."

Reed tapped the box with one index finger. "I've got six hundred and thirty seven dollars here. Am I correct in assuming a hit is five hundred?"

Devi leaned back and sighed through her cigarette. "You want me to kill someone."

"I'm offering you a job."

"Sweetheart, tell you what." She sat forward again. "You're rolling in it. I can't get out of town. If you buy me a horse, and then give me the half-grand for the hit, I will gladly bring back the head of whomever or whatever you want dead so badly you'd go graverobbing."

Reed's back stiffened. "I didn't go graverobbing," she snapped with a little too much force, "I was pointed towards a source of buried treasure by a reliable source."

"Don't say the same word twice in one sentence. It makes you sound messy."

"Do you want the job or not?" Again, a little more force than necessary. "I will buy you your horse if that's what you want."

"I've been around this town. If you think you can find a horse to be bought, you are sadly mistaken."

"I'll give you a ride to the next town over. Don't think I'm not coming. I'm not giving you upwards of six hundred dollars and then _not _making sure you get the job done."

Devi eyed her. "You know," she started, "normally the customary offer in that case is paying half before, half after."

"Two hundred and fifty is still a lot of money. I'm not going to watch it be carried away. _And…" _Reed scowled again. "I want to see this bastard die."

"Jesus." Devi raised an eyebrow. "What'd he do? Leave you at the alter or what?"

"That's…" Reed paused. "That's not important. Are you taking the job or not?"

"Of course. I thought we already established that, kid. We're hagglin', aren't we?"

Reed looked shocked. "What? No! Christ!" She glanced to the side and ran a hand through her hair. Then, as if remembering something important, she held it out to Devi. "By the way, I'm-"

"Reed. I know. They talk about you a lot here. Not the nicest bunch when you're not looking, eh?" She jabbed a thumb in the direction of the bar, where a number of workers appeared to be eyeing the pair subtly, jumping and looking away when Reed turned to look back.

"Honestly. I know they don't like me. I don't really care what a bunch of inbred hillbillies think."

Devi froze.

Then she laughed.

Very loudly.

Reed eyed her, taking the position of being unimpressed. "So I can come with you to see this hit _happen_, right?"

"Yeah. Yeah, kid, you can come."

~!~


End file.
